Sunday, April 27, 2014

Literacy - Spanning the U.S: Tulare CA, LIFE IN, Detroit MI

The Tulare
County Board of Supervisors designated today as Adult Literacy Day at its
weekly board meeting.

County Librarian
Jeff Scott, Program Manager Sue Gillison and Tulare Coordinator Kim Torrez came
before the board and audience to outline the activities of the Literacy
program. Ms. Gillison introduced Veronica Serrano and Mrs. Torrez presented
Kalash Rana as outstanding examples of achievement in literacy.

Board Chairman
Phil Cox asked the program administrators, tutors and learners to join him in
front of the audience as he made the proclamation presentation. Chairman Cox
noted that *What these learners, Veronica and Kalash, have told us is what we
need to hear about the importance of our literacy program."

A Jeffersonville
group is helping people learn a basic skill that most take for granted every
day, even at this very moment — reading.

-Don Walker and
others at Faith Lutheran Church founded LIFE, or Literacy Is For Everyone, a
free program for illiterate adults who are looking to get their high school
equivalency degrees or just wanting to function better in society.

Walker,
director of the program, said he was shocked to learn of the number of adults
in Clark and surrounding counties who don’t have a high school diploma. Many of
whom can’t read and haven’t had a place to learn. He said that LIFE is the
first adult literacy program in Jeffersonville.

“There’s been
no where to turn,” he said. “Part of the problem is the fact that these people
are often underemployed or unemployed, so they don’t have a whole lot of
money.” READ MORE !

Literacy
volunteers in Metro Detroit help break down language barriers

One’s from
Grosse Pointe; the other is originally from Dakar, Senegal. One is Catholic.
One is Muslim. One’s parents stressed education, as did the other’s — just not
for girls.

Differences fade
in their embrace before they settle into a cubicle with their workbooks at the
Dominican Literacy Center on Detroit’s east side. Nogaye Walker’s education
ended in the fourth grade. Christine Simon, who worked in retail and always
volunteered, is teaching her to read and write.

“She is a very
nice lady and always tells me, ‘You can do it,’ ” said Walker, 40, of
Southfield.

Simon returns
the compliment.

“But you
self-correct all the time,” she says. “The thought of me trying to speak your
language is just too difficult to even imagine.”

Walker, who
speaks French and Wolof, a language of Senegal, represents a growing number of
Metro Detroiters seeking literacy skills, especially among those in English as
a second language programs.

Nearly half of
Michigan’s adults — 44 percent — have minimal literacy skills, no greater than
those necessary to perform simple, everyday activities, according to the
Michigan League for Human Services.

Those numbers
are even higher in Detroit, according to Reading Works, an organization of
diverse leaders from the business, education, media, civic and faith
communities that is dedicated to boosting adult literacy in Metro Detroit. READ MORE !